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Obama, and Protests, at Notre Dame

Mandel Ngan/Agence France Presse-Getty ImagesPresident Obama waved as he arrived on the stage to attend Notre Dame’s commencement ceremony in South Bend, Ind., on Sunday.

This post followed the speech and events surrounding President Obama’s commencement address at Notre Dame in South Bend, Ind., on Sunday afternoon. Susan Saulny and Dirk Johnson contributed reporting from South Bend, and Liz Robbins from New York.

Father Ted | 4:00 p.m. Near the end of his speech, President Obama spoke about the Civil Rights Commission, whose resolutions were the foundation of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. One of the six members (one black and five whites) was the Rev. Theodore Hesburgh, then president of Notre Dame. Mr. Obama acknowledged how “Father Ted” brought the members of the commission to a retreat in Land O’Lakes, Wis., to break an impasse. Rev. Hesburgh found common ground when the men all spoke about being fishermen and took them on a twilight fishing trip.

“They fished, and they talked, and they changed the course of history,” Mr. Obama said, as CNN showed Rev. Hesburgh, who turns 92 next week, in attendance. “We are all fishermen,” Mr. Obama told his audience to remember.

Agree to Disagree | 3:31 p.m. President Obama said he was not suggesting that the debate surrounding abortion go away: “No matter how much we may want to fudge it – indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory – the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction. But surely we can do so without reducing those with differing views to caricature.”

The View Around Campus | 3:29 p.m. When the heckler interrupted Mr. Obama’s speech, several undergraduate students and their friends who were watching in a campus cafe hung their heads in disgust. One student said, “My stomach hurts.” But another woman in the cafe shouted, “Nothing is more important than human life!”

In protest of Mr. Obama, about two dozen graduating seniors gathered at an anti-abortion vigil at the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes on campus. Jon Buttaci, a graduating senior who skipped the commencement, said he recognized that his political views were a distinct minority here.

“The Catholicism on this campus doesn’t match up with what the larger church is teaching,” said Mr. Buttaci, who will study philosophy in the doctoral program at the University of Pittsburgh. “We’re standing up for prestige instead of standing up for the church.”

An Interruption | 3:08 p.m. A lone protester shouted, and then a chant erupted to follow soon after Mr. Obama began speaking.

As police officers took the protester away, much of the stadium cheered his removal. A few moments later, another single protester began shouting “Abortion is murder.” The crowd erupted with loud boos directed at the heckler and then broke into loud chanting of Mr. Obama’s campaign slogan, “Yes, we can.”

“We’re fine, everybody,” President Obama said, calming the students, some of whom had stood up. He continued to ad-lib based on the theme of his speech, saying: “We’re not going to shy away from things that are uncomfortable.”

Earlier, the president of Notre Dame, the Rev. John Jenkins, had introduced him by saying that “President Obama is not one to stop talking to those who differ with him.”

The Honorary Degree | 2:27 p.m. For all the anger and acrimony surrounding his visit, President Obama managed to get one thing from Notre Dame that he did not get from Arizona State University, where he delivered a commencement address last week. He just accepted an honorary doctor of law degree. Arizona State declined to give him an honorary degree, saying he had not yet accumulated the “body of work” that such recipients usually have.

Cheers from Crowd | 2:24 p.m. Suffice it to say that whatever the politics of abortion, this is not a hostile crowd for President Obama. As he entered the stadium, he was greeted by long, enthusiastic and sustained cheering that recalled his visits to other college campuses during last year’s presidential campaign.

Signs of Protest | 2:07 p.m. As students and professors flowed into Joyce Center, the university’s basketball arena converted into graduation hall, there was little sign of the protest outside the school gates. A relative handful of graduating students adorned their mortar board with yellow anti-abortion symbols. But just as many had Mr. Obama’s red-white-and-blue campaign logo on theirs.

Original Post | 1:56 p.m. President Obama planned to directly confront America’s deep divide over abortion on Sunday, appealing to partisans on both sides to find ways to respect one another’s basic decency and even work together to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies.

Mr. Obama was heading here to deliver the commencement address and receive an honorary degree at the University of Notre Dame after a fierce argument about whether it was appropriate for a prominent abortion rights supporter to be honored at one of the nation’s most storied Catholic institutions.

Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the main gates of Notre Dame on Sunday as Mr. Obama flew here aboard Air Force One, a day after two dozen people were arrested for trespassing or resisting law enforcement officers. Some of the 2,900 graduating students planned to boycott the ceremony, but many rejected the protests and said they wanted to hear what the president had to say.

“The problem here is that we’re trivializing abortion,” the Rev. Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life, said on “Fox News Sunday” before the commencement ceremony. “But the people are speaking out. People are getting angry that 1.2 million children are being aborted every year. Now this honorary doctorate today is a law degree. Law is for the protection of human rights.”

Rev. Richard McBrien, a Notre Dame professor appearing on the same show, said Mr. Obama’s positions on other issues, such as immigration and poverty, are consistent with Catholic thinking. “If we required 100 percent agreement with the Catholic Church’s official teaching from everyone who speaks at or gets an honorary degree from a Catholic university, we would then not have any politicians of either party,” he said.

Michael Steele, the chairman of the Republican National Committee and a Catholic, said Notre Dame should have split the difference, allowing Mr. Obama to address the ceremony but not giving him an honorary degree. “I think it’s inappropriate,” he said on “Meet the Press” on NBC. “And the president should speak, but the degree should not be conferred.”

Until Sunday, Mr. Obama has largely tried to avoid getting too enmeshed in the abortion debate and at times labored to straddle the divisions, saying at one point that he wanted “to tamp down some of the anger surrounding this issue.”

After taking office, he repealed President George W. Bush’s restrictions on federal money for international organizations that promote or provide abortion services overseas, but he did so in writing late on a Friday, calling little attention to the move. He later repealed Mr. Bush’s restrictions on federal money for embryonic stem cell research but he decided to leave it to Congress to decide whether to lift a ban on the use of tax dollars to create human embryos or to conduct research in which embryos are destroyed.

Likewise, at a news conference last month, he made clear that he does not plan to expend much political capital on behalf of the Freedom of Choice Act, a measure promoted by abortion rights supporters, even though he endorsed it on the campaign trail last year. “The Freedom of Choice Act is not my highest legislative priority,” he said.

But Notre Dame invitation and the pending retirement of Justice David H. Souter had pushed the issue to the forefront again. Any Supreme Court nominee Mr. Obama picks will be scrutinized for past opinions about Roe v. Wade, the decision upholding abortion rights.

And a new poll by Gallup suggested a shift in American public opinion on the issue. A majority of 51 percent in the survey called themselves “pro-life” on abortion compared with 42 percent who described themselves as “pro-choice,” the first time most American adults have identified themselves that way since Gallup began asking the question back in 1995.

An earlier version of this post misstated who gave President Obama his honorary degree. It was the provost Thomas G. Burish, not the university president, Rev. John Jenkins.

Several of the commentators should have added that a good chunk of each graduating class would not get their degree if 100% compliance with Catholic teaching were necessary. was necessary. Perhaps the school should not give degrees to students who have engaged in premarital sex (especially those who used birth control). And where were all these complaints when Bush, whose policies violate any number of Catholic tenets, spoke at the University several years ago.

Why do I get the idea Obama is using Notre Dame as a smokescreen to hide the really big sell-out he has engaged in this week regarding torture & G-Bay? Really, who cares if he speaks or not to the Irish graduation. He already has a law degree so the motive for the honorary degree is bogus. Obama is sucking up so hard to the right wing conservatives these days he better be careful. 2012 is not that far away and he continues to test the patience of those who voted for him and contributed significant sums to his campaign.

The fact remains that every woman who gets pregnant has a right to decide whether to continue the pregnancy. That is the law of the land. So who else would these “right to life” people have make that decision? A local committee of ‘interested perosns”? the local priest? the local sheriff? ,the woman’s neighbors? the legislature? or the Congress? (God forbid)

It is amazing to me that our finest institutions of higher learning have stooped to brainwashing students to HONOR such a lying, immoral fraud of a man, and have taught their students NOT to give credence to the facts, but to dismiss them and in substitution place some “hope” that he will act in an honorable fashion, not deceiving them and destroying their country. I’m afraid these young skulls full of pablum are asking to learn a lesson in a very, very painful way.

I wonder how many of the abortion protesters at Notre Dame voted for Obama. I wonder too how many would vote for him if he were pro-life. Zilch, I’d bet. My guess is the protest is as much anti-Obama as anti-abortion. Sterling Greenwood/Aspen Free Press

I am “pro-choice” regarding this difficult issue and strongly believe good people can passionately disagree on abortion rights. But is gets complicated when people try to make it a religious issue. Whenever religious mumbo-jumbo is part of the argument rational discussion cannot ensue.

First Obama spends and spends us into an unsustainable condition of borrowing to pay the interest on our borrowing, and then he tells us the other day that “this is unsustainable,” and talks to American citizens as if to blame THEM, for HIS borrowing. Has is occurred to any of you that Obama KNEW this would be the case WHEN he did the borrowing, and did it INTENTIONALLY, to destroy our country? Obama is stupid, but only in that he is immorally stupid. He knows clearly the effects he is having on this country. Yet, now he speaks up with the truth that it is unsustainable, so he can take CREDIT for warning people. Unbelievable fraud he is committing against the people of this nation, and to be honest, they deserve it because they let him do it. They did not engage their brains they were born with and use them for what they were intended. They will pay the price. Unfortunately, so will the rest of us who saw what the results would be and what is coming.

I just don’t get it. Why not focus on preventing unwanted pregnancy in the first place? Teach young people–and persuade the older–that sex is something serious and sacred? That they shouldn’t have sex with someone they would not want to have children with. Teach boys as well as girls to take responsibility for their own birth control. Why wait until an unplanned pregnancy happens to argue about what should be done?

As for the protests, they seem more anti-Obama than anti-abortion. Didn’t Jimmy Carter speak at Notre Dame? Aren’t his positions the same as Obama’s? Where were the potests then?

As for Michael Steele, his answer to this conflict reminds me of stories I’ve heard wherein a black student excelled at their work but was given a lesser grade so the other students wouldn’t feel bad. Yes, such things really did happen, and not as rarely nor as long ago as one would wish to believe.

You also might find it interesting that OBAMA was not INVITED to speak at Arizona State University’s commencement the other night. OBAMA called THEM and asked he if could speak there. I just wonder what his agenda was with that. But NOBODY will touch this story because it is very demeaning to Mr. Obama.

Since the appearance of George W. Bush, who as governor of Texas presided over the execution of more than 150 prisoners, failed to generate any noticeable discomfort among those now loudly protesting, I will assume this dust-up is simply anti-Obama, anti-Democratic, and represents nothing more than the relentless intellectual disconnect between what conservatives do and what conservatives say.

Once again, the media and the NYT has obscured the issue at hand by continuing to use the dichotomy of pro-choice and pro-life. Isn’t it possible to feel that abortion is wrong, but at the same tiem appreciate the complexities involved and the right for a person to run his or her own life? That would make one pro life and pro choice wouldn’t it? The actual debate is pro choice and anti choice, what the heck is so hard to understand about that?

Here’s what I’d like. I’d like all Presidents and Vice Presidents and any number of other Executive, Judicial and Congressional leaders to be banned from speaking at events like this at any time during their terms.

They need to get about doing the jobs they were hired to do, and putting on robes in South Bend and blathering about “the future, and leadership” and all that somehow doesn’t seem to dovetail with the serious issues facing us right now,; especially when it probably cost more in Secret Service and Air Force One costs for this single day than the rest of make in a year….

I believe that sitting Presidents should not accept invitations to speak at commencement ceremonies, nor should they accept honorary degrees. The first is supporting elitism, as it sends the message that some colleges and universities are “better” and therefore more deserving of others in having the POTUS address their commencements. The second compromises the ethics of the Office of the POTUS, as accepting an honorary degree is tantimount to the President personally accepting a significant gift — it is not the same as contributing an item to the White House, which in essence belongs to The People. The whole idea is bogus and should be discontinued. The President must hold himself or herself above the political brawls that can ensue from such appearances and acceptances of such gifts. Upon leaving office, a former President should be free to accept such invitations and gifts.

To no. 4: The country voted OUT a “lying, immoral fraud” and replaced him with an intellectual, as pride in ignorance is no longer acceptable. Meanwhile, bravo to those who see through the Church’s inconsistencies when it comes to issues of life.

This partisan poopery is so transparent and it is an insult to life. If these idealogues are not partisans and if they are really are concerned about the issue of abortion why did the former president Bush go around for eight years of presidency upholding Roe V Wade without a pip from these hypos?

And do they seriously feel a fetus is more important than a life of an actual human being?

If we all want to control other peoples’ lives based on our own individual beliefs we will have a very interesting country soon.

When Michael Steele, the African American chairman of the RNC, states the President of the United States, the first African American President of the United States, should not receive an honorary degree from Notre Dame, I realize that politics trumps all and that we are a desperately over-politicized nation, forever divided by back bench hate speech on both extreme wings, with an ignored majority of people who want to live happy, fruitful, generous, meaningful lives. Scoring political points matters most to him I suppose. With what gall does he call it inappropriate? When a second rate university like Arizona State University plays politics by withholding an honorary degree from the first African American President of the United States stating that his body of work is incomplete, I realize that politics trumps all and that we may in fact be something of a racist nation full of secretly harbored hatred for anything “not-white.” The powers that be at ASU seem to pick this particular time to raise their standards. That is beyond suspicious, downright idiotic and subliminally racist. I wonder if Mr. Steele and the powers that be at ASU are aware of the disturbing and pathetic irony of their political stances. Opposed to abortion myself, I wonder where the Catholics were in regard to the war and torture of the previous administration. Which crimes against humanity do they allow? The Catholic church, like all human institutions, is fallible and inconsistent. We should not dispose of it because of its mistakes. I wonder if the Catholics can accept this for themselves and withhold it from President Obama. Perhaps America is a broken hearted and broken nation. Perhaps hate and anger will rule the day and compassion and generosity toward others and letting God be the judge of all will disappear from view. And contrary to what Mr. Steele says, these universities hand out honorary degrees in large and indiscriminate numbers.

I’m glad that ASU chose not to award President Obama an honorary degree. I was on the fence about it until I heard Obama’s comments at the start of his speech. His remarks were childish and self-centered.

Regarding his appearance at Notre Dame and the issue of abortion I have serious concerns. Obama’s view regarding abortion is extreme. He not only supports the original Roe v Wade decision making abortion legal during the first tri-mester, he supports abortion up until the moment of birth and in some cases, after birth.

An interesting bit of trivia is that Roe (Linda McCorvey) who represented the “Anti-Life” or “Pro-Choice” position in Roe v Wade has since changed her position to being “Pro-Life” or as the NY Times like to characterize it, “Anti-Abortion.”

ANY president speaking at ANY campus will run into opposition. You cannot please all the people all the time. The difference on this occasion is that those opposing Obama at Notre Dame see themselves, Bush-like, as God’s soliders in a holy crusade. In their eyes, their own righteousness is absolute: there’s nothing on the other side to compromise or work with. “You’re either with us, or with the baby killers.” With that attitude, they shouldn’t be surprised that they accomplish nothing, and only further marginalize themselves, just like Bush’s followers.